There are several of us right here on JC who have ISR and Pred experience right here on JC, just from the military perspective. We can speak to the mission elements, mission duration, typical activities, etc, but obviously cannot add to the aspects specific to being a civilian contractor (like schedule management and the like).
Remember that most RPAs operating over in the warzones are launched and recovered (taken off and landed) by specifically dedicated groups of pilots in theater who have line-of-sight to the aircraft during those times (due to the altitudes line-of-sight to the satellites cannot always be maintained, and the time delay in the controls can lead to accidents).
If you are located in the CONUS, you will be getting a handoff of an aircraft all ready in flight and enroute to the tasking or at the tasking when you start your mission/shift.
With respect to your actions during the mission, it differs. We've discussed this on JC before, and there is disagreement as to the level of involvement of the pilot in mission execution. In the military, for a mission whose prime goal is simply intel collection (Pattern of life, FMV prime, etc), the pilot is really just a babysitter for the aircraft and a chauffeur for the intel payload. It is the Intel analyst who is driving the fight as far as where you go and what you look at when you get there, and it is a sensor operator who is pointing the FMV ball and talking/communicating with the "customer" you are working for. Previous posts in other threads here have indicated that tasks and responsibilities may be different for the civilian operators.
There is a whole spectrum of operations that an RPA can be involved in, from passive operations where you are essentially staring at nothing in order to collect data on the pattern of life of a group of people or a certain geographic area, all the way to being involved in overwatch of active raids by SOF troops or supporting real troops-in-contact engagements. There is a lot of real estate in between those two ends of the spectrum, and the "excitement factor" differs significantly depending on where you are on that continuum.
